Moroccan mall boasts largest aquarium

THE world's first and largest cone-shaped aquarium with an inner glass aquarium elevator debuted at the new Morocco Mall in Casablanca.

Aquadream, the 9.3 meter tall acrylic aquarium designed and built by International Concept Management, Inc. (ICM), is the centerpiece of the luxury giga-mall along Morocco's coast.

ICM designed the acrylic aquarium as an engaging experience focusing on the importance of preserving the world's oceans. To accomplish this, the one million liter acrylic aquarium - more than 1,000 metric tons of saltwater - resembles an upside-down cone that immerses guests for five minutes into the ocean from within a glass elevator traveling in an inner acrylic cylinder in center of the tank.

ICM CEO Roger R. Reynolds III said: "Aquadream presented challenges in the complexity of the design. But with our collective expertise working on the AquaDom cylindrical aquarium in Berlin, we successfully designed and built this acrylic aquarium to fulfill the vision of the project while maintaining our strict safety standards."

ICM also managed the aquarium installation in its entirety, including designing the coral reef to be accurate, functional, and safe; selecting aquatic animals that cohabitate; and designing the lighting, filtration systems, and control panels for the aquarium with fail safes to keep everything running safely at minimal levels until the full system can be restored. Additionally, the backwash recovery system recycles aquarium water, generating significant operational savings.

RPT assisted ICM with engineering, manufacturing, and assembly of the acrylic panels. Transportation restrictions required RPT to build the cone in seven sections which were then bonded together once on-site, while sister company RPT Asia, Ltd. supplied the inner cylinder for the elevator.

The exterior of the cone-shaped aquarium is 12.1 meters in diameter at the bottom of the cone and 13.4 meters in diameter at the top, with acrylic panels 7.8 meters tall and 12cm thick. The inner cylinder is 3.4 meters in diameter and 10cm thick.